WOMEN’S RACE REPORT

The Women’s final began with a hotly contested first lap prime won by Eléonore Saraiva of Aventon Factory Team who needed the three bonus points to take the championship series lead back from Team iBike’s Raphaele Lemieux. Unfortunately, Lemieux found her self out of the race with a flat just two laps later. With Lemieux out of the race, Ainara Elbusto of DC Road made her intentions of getting up the road very clear, launching several hard and early attacks to try and get away.

The five-time Red Hook Crit winner was not someone the field wanted to let go, and Elbusto’s attacks were covered by Ash Duban of Affinity Cycling, Carla Nafria of Specialized / Rocket Espresso, and Brooke Philips of Elf Huez*, who were all actively patrolling at the front of the race. Despite the abundance of aggression, the field would stay together going into the mid-race prime which was won decisively by Saraiva, determined to shore up her series lead. Duban countered the prime lap but was chased down by Tanja Erath of Fixedpott. Elbusto then took advantage of the fast pace and the strung-out field, jumping hard into turn six and immediately getting a gap.

As the field hesitated behind Elbusto, Duban jumped clear. Possibly after racing with Elbusto for four seasons, Duban knew it was then or never and committed fully to the bridge effort. Duban made the catch two laps later and the duo established an eight-second gap over the chasers. Behind the field tried to organize, but the duo of Duban and Elbusto continued to extend their gap. With three laps to go, Saraiva drilled it from the chase group in one final effort to bring back the leaders but she could only make a small dent in their lead.

Elbusto led through the line at one to go earning herself the Rockstar Games Top Antagonist Award for her efforts. But it was Duban who played the last lap just right, timing her move on the back straight perfectly and taking the inside line in the final hairpin to land the 2016 Series Champion her first win since Milan in 2014. Erath won the sprint from the field to round out the podium.

MEN’S RACE REPORT

Davíd Van Eerd had a breakout performance in Barcelona No.5 Photo by Tornanti.cc

The men’s race blasted off the line in Barcelona with pre-race favorites Eamon Lucas of Specialized / Rocket Espresso and Marius Petrache of Intelligentsia Racing going all out to try and win the first lap prime. But it was Tim Ceresa of the 8Bar Team who would claim the first lap honors. He was immediately countered by Lucas with Davide Vigano of Team Cinelli Chrome on his wheel.

This set of an absolutely vicious cycle of attack and counter-attack from the strongest teams in the race. As Specialized / Rocket Espresso would send riders up the road they would quickly be chased down by either Intelligentsia Racing, Aventon Factory Team, or Team Bahumer who then would send their own riders on the attack. The exception to this was Evan Murphy of Mash SF who was clearly only content pedaling his bike as hard as he could away from everyone else. Murphy, who had no teammates in the race launched several attacks and joined a few promising breakaways but despite the efforts, the field would stick together heading into the halfway prime. Kevin Girkins (Intelligentsia Racing), in his first Red Hook Crit event, went for it with Alec Briggs (Specialized / Rocket Espresso) and Murphy on his wheel. But it was come from behind effort by David Van Eerd that earned him the prime.

Due to all the pressure being applied at the front of the race Team Bahumer found it self in trouble with its leader Filippo Fortin completely isolated at the front heading into the crucial final laps of action. With just ten laps left to race current series leader Colin Strickland (Intelligentsia Racing) tried to break the field with yet another attack. But no one was about to start letting anything get away this late in the race. Specialized / Rocket Espresso put all of their riders on the front with four to go but the effort fell apart for them as Aldo Ino Ilesic dropped out with two to go. Van Eerd was back on the front with one to go claiming the Rockstar Games Top Antagonist Award. He managed to hold onto the rear wheels of Fortin and Vigano as they dueled for the lead on the back straight heading into the final hairpin and in a split second of sheer brilliance Van Eerd was able to outsprint both for the win. Vigano claimed second with Fortin rounding out the podium in third.